Don't Just Hang Around

Readings:

In
this Sunday's Gospel, we hear of ten virgins, five foolish and five wise. The
five wise ones have flasks of oil with their lamps. The foolish do not. Now,
why couldn't the five who had thought of it simply share some of their oil with
the others? Why did they have to make it so complicated? It could all have been
so simple. Instead it goes all wrong. While the young girls are off buying more
oil, the bridegroom arrives. The door is being locked, and when they are back,
they can't come in.

The
immediate question that arises is regarding the oil and what it signifies. Some
have proposed that the oil is our good deeds that come from living lives of
faith. But what if the oil is the faith itself? Suddenly it seems that the
whole parable makes sense. It is one thing to wait for the bridegroom, which is
Christ.

But it is not enough to wait for the bridegroom with the others if the
waiting is not accompanied by inner faith. God is not asking us only to 'hang
around', he asks for our personal engagement as a response to his engagement
towards us.
The
Church is the institution who has as her prime mission to announce the Gospel
of the Lord, leading all people to faith by the sacraments and the liturgy, and
through the lives of every Christian who witnesses to the mercy of God. The
Church is a collective project. It is through the people of God that the
presence of Christ is realised here on earth, as we wait for his second coming
on the last day.

But at the same time the salvation of humanity is not brought
about in a Marxist fashion. The work of salvation is not realised as though by
the collective masses. It also involves the individual, with his or her
personal project. Faith involves a personal encounter between Christ and me, a
work of the Holy Spirit that gives me access to God's Kingdom and the Father Himself.

One
who in his time shed light on the theology of faith was Martin Luther. Even
though some of Luther's writing had a polemic sting against the Catholic
Church, his focus on faith is an important reminder to us today about how
central to our lives Christian faith is, and what a great gift it is.After having received the Sacraments of
Baptism and Reconciliation, and as we are nourished by Christ's own body and
blood, we are meant to grow in intimate friendship with Jesus through our
earthly pilgrimage. The nourishing oil that permits this growth is the Holy
Spirit working in us in mysterious ways.

Luther formulated this beautifully as
he wrote the third article of his Small
Catechism:

I believe that I cannot
come to my Lord Jesus Christ by my own intelligence or power. But the Holy
Spirit called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, made me holy and
kept me in the true faith, just as He calls, gathers together, enlightens and makes
holy the whole Church on earth and keeps it with Jesus in the one, true faith.

It
doesn't matter if it's the wisest theologian or the criminal on the cross; we
are all called to enter into relationship with our God and Saviour in an always
deeper way. The Holy Spirit works in us, but God also calls for our
cooperation. The loving relation God wishes for also involves our will and our
whole being. We must seek God where he is to be found. He comes to us in the Eucharist
and in the life of prayer of the Church. He reaches out to us in the Sacrament
of Reconciliation. And he touches us through the love lived out in meeting with
those we encounter and those who are around us.

If we want to ensure that our
inner lamps are filled, we have to let us be touched by Him who longs for us.
Saint
Augustine described his way toward this personal encounter in his Confessions. Let us then meditate on how
God unites with us as he engages all our senses in order to reach us:

Belatedly I loved thee,
O Beauty so ancient and so new, belatedly I loved thee. For see, thou wast
within and I was without, and I sought thee out there. Unlovely, I rushed
heedlessly among the lovely things thou hast made. Thou wast with me, but I was
not with thee. These things kept me far from thee; even though they were not at
all unless they were in thee. Thou didst call and cry aloud, and didst force
open my deafness. Thou didst gleam and shine, and didst chase away my
blindness. Thou didst breathe fragrant odours and I drew in my breath; and now
I pant for thee. I tasted, and now I hunger and thirst. Thou didst touch me,
and I burned for thy peace.(Book 10, chapter 27,translated and edited by Albert C. Outler)